By Design
by gilmoregirl111
Summary: What happens when everything you have ever wanted is ripped from your hands? You fight to keep it.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclamer: **I don't own Gilmore Girls. None of it. Not even the DVD's. Kind of sad, I know.

**Summary: **What happens when everything you have ever wanted is ripped from your hands? You fight to keep it. Takes place in the begining of season seven. Not too far into it though, no specific time period there.

She stepped out into the cold crisp air. Where she was going she wasn't sure, but her mind was wondering and now so were her feet. Minutes later she arrived at a building. It took her a good thirty seconds to comprehend that she had stopped walking. It was then that she noticed _him_. He moved about the diner serving coffee and taking orders. She stood there for what seemed to be hours, but in reality were only a few minutes. _He _never noticed her, but she surely noticed _him_. The way his muscles flexed when he wiped the counter down, the way his face crinkled in disgust when somebody ordered their food. She continued to walk after she realized that it was wrong to stare at _him._ After all, it had only been two months since she had called _him_ her fiancé.

Things had been so screwed up lately. She was married to Christopher, but they both knew it wasn't right, he wasn't right. She couldn't blame Chris though, he was trying, in reality he was being the perfect husband, but her heart just wasn't in it.

This time when she looked up she was at the Twickham house. This house symbolized everything. This is where she was supposed to live with _him_. They were supposed to have kids, plants, and wear matching jogging suits in that house. But that idea was thrown out of the window when she and Rory had been fighting, but she and _he_ had decided to live in her house; to have kids, plants, and matching jogging suits in her house.

Once again she was wrong. He had a daughter and he didn't tell her. Hell forget about telling her, he wouldn't even let her near his daughter. So she did what she did best, she ran. She gave _him_ an ultimatum and when he didn't give her an answer she walked away. He didn't want her and she wasn't going to waste her time trying to make him. She got in her car and drove away, this time to Christopher.

It was a night she'd never forget and always regret. She knew it was a mistake as soon as the door clicked shut, but she need to feel wanted and Chris always wanted her. So she pretended, pretended to want him, pretended to need him, all the while imagining it was _him_ she was married to. It was _him_ that she woke up to every morning and made love to at night.

Sometimes she swore she heard _him_ in the kitchen making dinner as soon as she got home. His presence was still in her house. It didn't matter that she had gotten rid of everything that had reminded her of _him_. He was her everything, the reason she woke up in the morning, the cause of the butterflies that had started calling her stomach home.

Her mind was wondering when she arrived back home. She walked into the kitchen when she heard a loud noise come from outside. She walked through the kitchen and into the foyer to open the door and when she did she saw Christopher in the front yard trying to move the chuppah, _their_ chuppah.

"What are you doing?" Lorelai cried out frantically.

"Oh, well I just thought I'd surprise you and take the chuppah out of the yard, we don't use it s-"

Before he could finish she cut him off. "Why? What were you going to do with it? It's not yours!" She blurted out in a hurry.

With an annoyed sigh and slightly confused face he answered, "Well I was going to take it to an antique store and see if I could get us some extra cash and then take all of those boxes in the garage and give them to charity."

"Were you even going to ask me?" She replied.

"I didn't think you'd need it, I mean this is all _his_ stuff. Why do you need it anyways? You married me." He said with a tone of disgust.

"Yeah, and look how great that turned out to be." She retorted angrily.

"What's that supposed to mean?" He asked as his voice rose.

"It means that I'm done trying to pretend that we are happy, that I am happy. I can't do this anymore. I want out! It was a mistake from the start. You know it and I _definitely_ know it!" She screamed, furious that he would just assume he could do whatever he wanted with her stuff, with _his_ stuff.

By now she was sure that Babette was listening and most likely talking to Miss Patty, but she didn't care, she had to get all of this pain, this guilt, off of her chest.

"If that's how you feel, then fine, I'm gone." Chris climbed into his car and sped down the street, out of Stars Hollow.

Lorelai stood in her yard. The night began to get colder, but she didn't notice her mind was too busy moving at the speed of light. Thirty minutes later she turned around to walk inside. When the door closed she realized everything that had just happened was not a dream, but in fact reality.

_Oh god tomorrow is going to suck _she thought. Without another thought she climbed the stairs to her bedroom and fell asleep minutes later.


	2. Heaven Forbid

**Disclamer: **I don't own it. None of it, not even the DVD's. Sad, I know.

**A/N:** To prove to you all that I am dedicated to this story, I am updating now, on this, the day of my daughters wedding. J/K. But seriously, I should be packing to move and getting ready to go out to dinner with my friends. But hey, I thought _It's Friday, why not give the people what they want? _Oh also! I now have a new found respect for the authors on this hear beautiful website. I used to wait and wait nd sometimes be upset when people didn't update fast enough for my liking, but now I realize it is a lot harder than it seems to write a long chapter.

**Thank you to all of my reviewers, even though there were only four, I want to thank you all. It encourages me to write more. :) ---did you catch that subtle hint?**

**Anyways, on with the story. Enjoy.**

**Heaven Forbid-a.ka. Chapter Two**

When she woke up the next morning she rolled over carefully, half expecting Christopher to be there. He wasn't. After their fight he never called or came home so Lorelai figured that he really took her answer as a rejection, finally. She thought about last night. She wasn't the greatest at communicating her feelings that she bottled up for weeks at a time. She knew that she was harsh to Chris last night, but she could not hide the feeling of weight lifting off of her chest.

She sat up and made her way out of bed and got ready for the day. She went through her daily routine of a shower, dressing, fixing her hair, eating a pop tart, and grabbing coffee on her way out of the house. _Coffee_ that was something that Lorelai could never go without, it was her lifeline; without it she was sure she would look ten years older. _His_ coffee was so much better. She knew that he put nutmeg in it, but there was just something about _his_ coffee that encompassed her body and made her feel like she was home.

As she pulled into her parking space at the Dragonfly, she stared down into her coffee cup, and then took a long sip. It just wasn't the same, sure it was coffee, but it wasn't _his_ coffee.

It was then that it hit Lorelai. It was going to be like this for the rest of her life. He was in everything, and if she didn't have him she would always think about how much better her life would be if she did. She had a craving for _him_ and if she never satisfied it, she would never be happy.

A knocking roused her from her thoughts, _oh god so many thoughts_. It was Sookie giving her a quizzical look. She rolled down her window and said, "Hey Sookie," trying to muster up some confidence and happiness in her voice.

"Sweetie, you do know that you have been sitting in your car for twenty minutes, right? It's freezing out here, come inside. I made this amazing batch of pumpkin cookies and the guests just love them. Of course they better; it took me three days to prefect that recipe. First I had too much pumpkin which can be bad beca-"

Lorelai cut Sookie off from her long rant saying, "Sookie, Sookie, slow down! I'm sure your cookies are amazing and everybody will love them."

Sookie smiled then her face turned to confusion when she noticed Lorelai's usually bright smile being forced. "Honey what's wrong? Is it Rory? Is she okay?" She asked frantically.

"Rory is fine Sook, I was just thinking about things."

"What kind of things? Christopher things?" Sookie wondered.

"Um, yeah, Chris stuff. Listen Sookie, I'm going to tell you something, but it may not come as a surprise to you." Lorelai started.

"You're not pregnant are you? Oh god, you're pregnant with Chris' baby aren't you?" Sookie fumbled out, secretly hoping the latter to be false.

"God no! I'm not pregnant. Why would I get pregnant with Chris's baby? I only want babies with Luke." Lorelai rambled on not realizing what she was saying.

"Sookies eyes widened and a thousand watt smile appeared on her lips. "So you and Luke are talking again?" She asked eagerly.

"What?!" Lorelai all but screamed.

"Well you just said that you only want to have babies with Luke, so I just assumed you guys talked. I mean the _Luke_ topic has been off limits with you for months. If his name is even mentioned you get the look on your face." Sookie explained.

"The look? What look?" Lorelai asked confused.

"You know, the I'm-uncomfortable-please-don't-talk-about-my-ex-fiancé- look." Sookie elaborated.

"I do not get that look." Lorelai scoffed.

"Yes you do, but that's not what you wanted to tell me." Came Sookies reply.

"Oh right, well last night when I came home from work I heard a loud noise coming from outside, so I went to the door and opened it to so Christopher out in the yard moving _the chuppah_. Lorelai stated.

"No!?" Sookie said appalled.

"Yes. So I ask him what he is doing and he goes on to tell me that he was going to "surprise" me by getting rid of the chuppah and all of Luke's boxes." Lorelai explained.

"That's not his stuff though." Sookie said in a confused tone.

"Right, that's exactly what I said. So I flipped out on him. We ended up having it out on the front yard. I basically told him that I was done pretending I am happy with him then he stormed off in his car and hasn't called since."

"Oh honey, I'm sorry." Sookie sympathized with Lorelai.

"Don't be, it was a long time coming. I knew all along it was wrong, I've just been fighting it. I mean, we have tried so many times, I don't know why I thought this time would be any different. It was a mistake, everything was a mistake." She added the last part as an afterthought.

"Well, every girl is aloud to have a mistake, or two, or three." Sookie giggled. She wanted to ask about the last part, but decided not to push it. After all, Lorelai had not been the most open person lately. "So did you want to come in? Or were you going to just sit out here all day?" Sookie asked with a beaming smile.

"Oh, um, actually I have to go run and errand I forgot about." Lorelai said.

"Okay then, I'll see you later then?" Sookie more asked then said.

"Yeah, I'll be in a little later."

As she rolled up her window she watched Sookie walk back to the inn. She knew what she had to do, and she had to do it now. She put her jeep into drive and made her way toward the center of town.

The town was buzzing with activity. It seemed like everybody had something to be happy about. It made her sick. How could every sing person in town be so happy when she was suffering so much?

She sat in her car parked across the street from _his_ diner. This is where it all started. She remembers it like yesterday. She still knows exactly what he was wearing that day. Not that it was hard to do because he seemed to have an infinite supply of flannel, but who was she to complain? She had grown to love the flannel, as well as the man in it. It only took her two years to fall in love with him, but this time she was still calling him Duke. No need to let the town catch wind of her new found love. So she played it cool, denying anything between them, and denying her true feelings about him. If she had ever known that he was doing the same thing they would have been together much sooner.

Looking at him you wouldn't think he would make a good partner, but he did. She loved the way he kissed her and the fact that his hands fit hers so perfectly. She saw a side of Luke that nobody else did, and she cherished the times they spent just lying in her bed together, holding each other, when he would whisper his love for her in her ear. She would tell him how happy she was that they were together and how he was all she would ever want, need, and more. Those were the things she loved the most. The little things. They could be stranded on a desert island with no entertainment and she would be just fine with that as long as they were together.

She looked into the diner, quickly scanning the area to find _him_. When she spotted him, he was coming out of the curtains leading up to his apartment. He looked different to her, not the same man she had loved for eight years secretly and loved for two years out loud, but then again he looked the same. He still took her breath away, even after everything. There was something about his day old stubble, flannel shirt, jeans, and baseball cap that made her crave his touch.

_Gah!_ It was like she couldn't turn her mind off. It was always thinking, thinking about _him_. If she didn't know the situation better, she would think of herself as a stalker. It just wasn't natural to think about him as much as she did. He probably didn't spend this much, if any, time thinking about her and how things would be so much better if they were together.

She had been sitting in her car for what she guessed to be about thirty minutes. At the exact moment she reached for her keys to start her car, _he_ looked up from his order pad and noticed her sitting in her car. They locked eyes and it felt like time was standing still. He looked away after several seconds, but she kept looking. It was a sign, it had to be. She knew that he had sensed her there; he always seemed to know when she was near.

When he looked back over to her car she smiled a little and waved, he looked unsure, but gave a slight smile and waved back. She now knew what she had to do, and now was the time to do it. She opened her car door and stepped out onto the hard concrete of the sidewalk. As she slowly crossed the street, her heart began to race and so did her mind. She was less than ten steps away from the diner door.

_Oh god, what if this was a mistake?_ She thought.

It was too late to turn back now, so she pushed the door open and walked in.

**Now do it..hit the little purple button and review. Thank you. :)**


	3. Slow Dancing in a Burning Room

**Disclamer: **I don't own it. None of it, not even the DVD's. Sad, I know. Oh, and none of the song titles that I use for my chapters. :)

**A/N:** Sorry it's been a couple days. Gotta love moving. Anyways. Here you go. Enjoy.. :)

**A/N2:** Also, I don't own any of the chapter names. The names come from songs I listen to while writing. If you want the full playlist for this story, it will be on my profile soon. This chapter title is from the song "Slow Dancing in a Burning Room" by John Mayer. The last chapters title is "Heaven Forbid" by The Fray.

**Slow Dancing in a Burning Room a.k.a. Chapter 3**

The bells above the diner rang the sweet song she knew all too well. She was brought back to four months ago when they were still together.

_It was a beautiful sunny day outside as she came bounding into the diner. The minute she saw him her mood had brightened even more, if that was possible. He gave her a smile, which he only saved for her, as she walked up to the counter and gave him a quick kiss. They continued to have their banter about coffee being bad for her and in the end he had given up and just given her a cup of coffee. They talked for a couple minutes before she left for work. With a kiss and a promise of seeing him later, she left._

It was funny to her now that she could have a great flashback, from just a sound, in a matter of seconds. She snapped out of it and looked around, there were only a couple of people eating, which of whom she did not recognize. She looked toward the counter and saw Luke staring at her with a look of mixed emotions: shock, anger, vulnerability, love, and nervousness. She imagined her face looked similar to his, even though she was the one who made the move to come and talk.

She was about to just turn around and leave, thinking it was a mistake, when she saw him lean down and grab a mug, _her mug_. She slowly and cautiously walked up to the counter and sat on a stool while he turned around to grab the coffee pot. When he turned around and started pouring her some coffee she said, "Wow, no lecture?" She was trying to ease the undeniable tension in the room. Lorelai felt like she had impending doom hanging over her head.

"Nope, you're old enough to make your own decisions; you've proved that pretty well." Luke replied, slightly annoyed.

"Yeah, well, I guess when you are left alone to make decisions it's a lot easier to make the wrong ones." Lorelai shot back. If he was going to play this game, then so was she.

"Some people have different definitions of 'left alone'; I would say it's when you have nothing and nobody. No kid, no spouse, no friends. Whereas you would define being 'left alone' as having a kid, fiancé, friends, and hell, even a dog." Luke barked. He was angry that Lorelai thought she could just come into the diner, _his diner_, and pretend like nothing happened, like they weren't engaged to be married. Like she didn't go off and marry that asshole.

"Yeah well, some people have different definitions of 'fiancé'. You think that it means hiding your daughter and shutting your fiancé out. I think 'fiancé' is somebody who tells you everything no matter if it is good or bad. Somebody who would be more than happy to introduce his daughter to his fiancé." Lorelai fumed. How dare he talk to her like it was all her fault. He's the one that shut her out, who forced her to give him an ultimatum.

By that time the few people that were in the diner were staring at them.

"Mind your business!" Luke's voice boomed through the diner. The people quickly scattered out of the door scared.

"Look, I didn't come in here for this, so I'm ju-" before she could finish her sentence, Luke cut in.

"What did you come in here for? To rub my face in the fact that you married that asshole? Will it make you feel better if I admitted that I was jealous? Ha? Well there you go, I just did. Are you happy now? Is that what you came in here for?" Luke ranted.

Lorelai's face stilled the moment Luke admitted to being jealous about her and Christopher's relationship. "I-I don't even know what to say to that. Wow, never thought I'd say that." _He was jealous? He did care._ All this time she had just assumed that he could care less, that he was happy just being Luke Danes, diner owner and father.

"All right, well now that I've made an ass out of myself, I'm just gonna go into the kitchen." Luke turned to walk away when he heard her speak.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! That's not how this works. You can't just run away when things don't go your way." Lorelai stated.

"Why not? You did. That's what you always do." Luke replied.

"That's not true!" Lorelai yelled.

"Oh yeah? Then what do you call giving me an ultimatum and then sleeping with Chris when things didn't go your way?" Luke asked.

"That's completely different. You didn't want me, you didn't love me. What was I supposed to do? Sit around and wait for you to realize that I was still there, waiting in the corner?"

"I didn't love you? I didn't love you? Oh that's rich. If I didn't love you would I have agreed to marry you? Would I have taken your dog to the vet and stayed up all night with him? Would I have made you a Santa Burger and made you a stash of coffee at the dance marathon? I've loved you since the first day you walked into the diner ranting crazily about coffee. You know how much I loved you, still love you. You and Rory mean everything to me. You were just looking for a way out. You got scared and ran." Luke ranted.

The whole time Luke was declaring his love for her; Lorelai couldn't help but think that everything he was saying was true. Had she ruined everything between them? Did she freak out over nothing? Wait, she wasn't the only one who brought on their bitter separation. After all, it takes two.

"I wasn't running scared. You shut me out. I love you and I told you, but you had other priorities, you had April. Don't get me wrong, I don't blame her and I think it's amazing you have a daughter, but you wouldn't let me in. You were so shut off; don't you see what that did to me? It killed me. The thought that the man I loved didn't love me back crushed me. I'm not getting any younger. I wanted to marry you, to have kids with you. The whole package. You were it for me, but you couldn't see that. You couldn't see the pain you put me through. You slowly stopped coming home and shut yourself out. I couldn't break down you wall, you didn't want me to. The day you referred to our house as _my house_, and my house only, I knew that you had checked out. That I had lost you for good." Lorelai said, trying to keep her tears at bay.

Luke looked at her with a look of pity.

"No, don't look at me like that! Don't pity me, you didn't want me, so I did what I knew to do, I moved on. I _tried_ to move on. It's like I can't think of anything or anybody but you. You're like a virus eating away at me until I am nothing." Lorelai was now full on crying. She couldn't hold it in anymore. She was still in love with him and he needed to know everything.

Luke stood there shocked. He now realized what he had done. He had broken her. She was a shell of the woman he used to know. It was then that he really looked at her, really took in her physical appearance. Her eyes did not carry the same glow, her hair was disheveled. He couldn't believe he had done that. He took the woman he loved, the one person in the world that understood him the most, and he had crushed her.

"Lorelai, I...I just. God! I suck at talking. I mean here we are having a conversation and the only thing I can think to say is Oy with the poodles already! Which has nothing to do with our situation, I just remember you at one point had said that and it's always stuck." Luke fumbled out.

He was losing his chance; he could see it in her eyes. Something was holding him back though. Fear? Fear of trying again only to fail. Fear of his heart breaking again. Fear of rejection. Could he really do this-_them_- again?

"Look, I didn't come in her with the intentions of a pity party for me, for us. My cards are on the table. I don't have anything else to say, so I'm just going to go. Goodbye Luke." Lorelai spoke softly, and then turned around and walked out of the diner for, what she though, was the last time.

As she walked home, the cold air bit at her fingers turning them numb. The thought of them actually being over for good, with no chance of reconciliation as lovers or friends, saddened Lorelai; slowly she started to think it was for the best. Could she really go through it again? Through their amazing, spectacular, rollercoaster of a relationship? She wasn't sure she even had the strength to make it to her bedroom, what made her think she could possess the strength to be with him again? As she prepared for bed, she slowly took the first step toward accepting her life without the only man she ever loved, Luke Danes.

**Luke's POV**

It always took Luke Danes longer to process information, than it did others. So when Lorelai walked out of the diner, he stood in the same position for a good five minutes. Had she really just come in here and did they really just fight? Did they really just confess their love for each other? His relationship with Lorelai had had always carried its questions for him, but he couldn't understand what was holding him back.

She had come into the diner on her own. Nothing or nobody had forced her to that he knew of. She had to have wanted some sort of reconciliation; why else would she just waltz in after two months of absence from the diner?

Lorelai had come into his diner, confessed her love for him, then left with one question hanging in the air _what was his next move going to be?_ Why was he still sitting here? Why wasn't he running after her? Then a familiar voice went off in his head.

'_Sometimes the only thing that is holding you back is not your pride, but the fact that you have not forgiven yourself.'_

His father had told him that once. He never thought it to be true, until now. Luke Danes had one task: forgiving himself.

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**As always. Reviews are appreciated. The buttons right underneath this note, how convenient. :)**


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